By Doug “Uncola” Lynn via TheBurningPlatform.com
It’s always fun to see what new internet sensation will next captivate and surprise the blogosphere everywhere and all at once. The most recent phenomenon to take the media-bubble by storm occurred last week by means of the Laurel or Yanny debate. In the event the reader has been living under a rock, or in a cave, over the last several days it all started when someone on reddit posted a short audio clip of a computer pronouncing the word “laurel”. Of course nothing would have come from it, except that other people who heard the clip swore they heard a word similar to “yanny” being pronounced instead.
As the debate went viral across all media platforms, Team Trump even Twittered on the matter from the White House.
At first, I thought it may have been an acoustic hoax whereby two separate recordings were alternating, but that was not the case. When I, personally, played the clip to people in the same room, at the same time, they heard either “laurel” or “yanny”; as did I. We were confounded at how we heard completely different sounds from the same recording.
Obviously, there was a scientific explanation and the mystery was solved according to the frequency by which people processed the audio.
This also called to mind an internet sensation from three years ago known as “The Dress”. It was another ethernetic spectacle, except one which began on Tumblr when a user posted a photo of a striped frock along with the caption:
“guys please help me – is this dress white and gold, or blue and black? Me and my friends can’t agree and we are freaking the f–k out.”
Evidently, in viewing photos of the woman’s dress for sale, neural connections to the visual cortex caused some to see the garment as blue with black lace fringe, whereas others could see it only as white with gold lace fringe.
In pondering both of these viral online and media curiosities by which people listened to, and viewed, the same things – yet heard, and saw, them in such diverse ways, I began to wonder if similar anomalies could be occurring within partisan politics today; and if these might not even be anomalies at all.
Consider, for example, the Trump Deplorables versus ANTIFA, the Fox News and MSNBC cable news networks, cable TV hosts Sean Hannity versus Rachel Maddow, and U.S House Intelligence Committee leaders Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff: All represent two sides of their respective coins, all completely divergent from the other; two interpretations of the same story, or trains on the same track traveling in opposite directions.
How can that be?
In the example of certain internet peculiarities, and as identified heretofore, there were scientific explanations.
However, when perusing political partisanship, perhaps the “science” equates more to preferences, or values; and, ultimately, (dare I say it?) morality?
For example, in an attempt to minimize any blowback from the forthcoming Inspector General’s report, FBI officials have admitted their spying on Donald Trump’s 2016 Presidential Campaign. The spying occurred by way of a secret surveillance initiative code named “Crossfire Hurricane”.
Unsurprisingly, however, instead of factually reporting on what the President of the United States has called the biggest American political scandal since Watergate, the New York Times continued to spin, enable, and downplay the government’s crimes as “missteps”, congressional and presidential allegations of “bias”, and “sound-bite-sized accusations” of “conspiracy”.
According to the Times:
And there were missteps. Andrew G. McCabe, the former deputy F.B.I. director, was cited by internal investigators for dishonesty about his conversations with reporters about Mrs. Clinton. That gave ammunition for Mr. Trump’s claims that the F.B.I. cannot be trusted. And Mr. Strzok and Lisa Page, an F.B.I. lawyer, exchanged texts criticizing Mr. Trump, allowing the president to point to evidence of bias when they became public.
The messages were unsparing. They questioned Mr. Trump’s intelligence, believed he promoted intolerance and feared he would damage the bureau.
The inspector general’s upcoming report is expected to criticize those messages for giving the appearance of bias. It is not clear, however, whether inspectors found evidence supporting Mr. Trump’s assertion that agents tried to protect Mrs. Clinton, a claim the F.B.I. has adamantly denied.
Mr. Trump’s daily Twitter posts, though, offer sound-bite-sized accusations — witch hunt, hoax, deep state, rigged system — that fan the flames of conspiracy. Capitol Hill allies reliably echo those comments.
In return, a takedown of the NYT article was published in the National Review:
The scandal is that the FBI, lacking the incriminating evidence needed to justify opening a criminal investigation of the Trump campaign, decided to open a counterintelligence investigation. With the blessing of the Obama White House, they took the powers that enable our government to spy on foreign adversaries and used them to spy on Americans — Americans who just happened to be their political adversaries.
The Times averts its eyes from this point — although if a Republican administration tried this sort of thing on a Democratic candidate, it would be the only point.
Have you, Dear Reader, ever noticed how the morality of the Liberal Left changes like the wind? The same media platforms, and pundits, who daily call upon the ghost of Richard Nixon to disparage Republicans, are now desperately downplaying the largest political scandal in the history of the United States.
But, unlike the debates on Laurel versus Yanny, or The Dress, political perceptions are not relative according to the science of the senses. Instead, they are choices.
This is why the Corporate Mainstream Media outlets spin and the social media platforms censor. They do so in order to prevent the various truth-bombs from bursting hourly within the most secure of safe spaces. That implies motive. Notwithstanding, even though the Messengers have strenuously tried to dam (and damn?) the endless floods of facts, they have failed; because the barrage, like waves, keeps on coming and coming; one after the other.
Even previous scandals like the Obama administration’s Fast and Furious gun-smuggling scheme have been recently resurrected into the light of a new day.
And then, as if on cue, gunfire erupted on one of Trump’s golf courses in Florida as well as at a high school in Santa Fe, Texas; where multiple people were killed. According to CNN, it was the 22nd school shooting this year.
Of course, as in most modern mass shootings, strange irregularities were reported and similar to other previous mass-causality events, a drill was underway at the time:
Angelica Martinez, a 14-year-old student, told CNN she and her schoolmates were being evacuated at one point ‘like it’s a fire drill.’
‘We were all standing (outside), but not even five minutes later, we started hearing gunshots,’ she said. ‘And then everybody starts running, but like the teachers are telling us to stay put, but we’re all just running away.’
Nonetheless, if the political headlines were hitting a little too close to the bullseye, then the timing of another school shooting may have seemed fortuitous for some; but at the expense of others.
Typically, under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t question the official narratives of mass causality events; except these are not normal times. That and the fact a former United States Naval Intelligence Briefing Team member, by the name of William Cooper, warned America in 1991 about a secret CIA initiative that was, allegedly, designed to “do away with the 2nd Amendment”. In his book, “Behold a Pale Horse”, Cooper wrote:
The government encouraged the manufacture and importation of firearms for the criminals to use. This is intended to foster a feeling of insecurity, which would lead the American people to voluntarily disarm themselves by passing laws against firearms. Using drugs and hypnosis on mental patients in a process called Orion, the CIA inculcated the desire in these people to open fire on schoolyards and thus inflame the antigun lobby. This plan is well under way, and so far is working perfectly. The middle class is begging the government to do away with the 2nd amendment.
– Cooper, Milton William. (1991). “Behold a Pale Horse”, Light Technology Publications, page 225.
Change the national narrative AND take the guns. Two birds, one stone? By accident or design?
In any event, whether the most recent school shootings in Parkland and Santa Fe were conspiracy or coincidence is beyond the purview of this piece. The point is, for the time being, that the recent school shooting in Santa Fe did not successfully divert the dialogue from the Obama administration’s egregious spying on its political opposition. This , in spite of the predictable, pre-conditioned, and programmatic, non-stop coverage by mainstream media outlets, the Democratic Party calls for congressional action on gun control, and the typical George Soros backed organizations calling the NRA a “terrorist organization”.
Indeed, to the political leftists, and according to the science affecting their particular senses:
– It is moral to conveniently, and expeditiously, exploit the insanity of children in order to challenge the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens.
– It is moral to impeach a president upon the allegations of a porn star, but not by way of a veritable stained dress once worn by a young White House intern.
– It is moral to prosecute a president for non-existent Russian collusion, but not a Democratic Party presidential candidate who colluded with Russian agents to conspire against her political opponent; or a former U.S. Secretary of State whose “charitable” foundation received $145 million for selling 20% of America’s uranium supply to Russia.
– It is moral for the former FBI director and the assistant Attorney General who illegally covered up the bona fide crimes of said former presidential candidate and Secretary of State, to now conspire together in an illegal coup against a constitutionally elected president.
Does the law even matter anymore? Did it ever matter?
Or, in a random universe, is morality relative and power the final arbiter of every dispute?
These were the exact questions I was contemplating at dinner a few nights ago when a seemingly random series of circumstances propelled me toward new insights.
It all began when my wife showed me the graduation invitation for a young man who looked similar to a younger version of an actor whose name I couldn’t quite recall. I knew the actor was in a movie from a few years back that I really liked, but I couldn’t remember the name of the film either. So, I picked up my phone and searched for “best modern westerns”. The film I had earlier enjoyed was called “Hell or High Water” and the actor’s name was Ben Foster.
At the same time, however, the name of another film popped up in the search. The title was “3:10 to Yuma”; a film I had not seen because I had, up until that point, confused it with a Nicolas Cage film which had horrible reviews. Needless to say, I was surprised to see that particular film ranked in a search for “best modern westerns”. Upon later researching “3:10 to Yuma”, however, I realized it was not the film I had thought. It was, instead, a remake that came out in 2007 and starred Christian Bale and Russell Crowe.
Paradoxically, it appeared the actor Ben Foster was in that film too.
Slightly strange happenings within the random universe.
So I went ahead and acquired the film, called it up on my system, and watched it that very night.
It blew me away.
As someone who enjoys a good western, I was additionally pleased to have been presented with a profound moral tale.
The story began when the henchmen of a money lender who, on behalf of the railroad, burned down the barn of an indebted farmer named Dan Evans, played by Christian Bale. The farmer was a one-legged Civil War veteran who, the following day, took his two young sons in search of the family’s scattered herd of cattle. In so doing, they came across a stagecoach robbery and then face-to-face with the notorious arch-villain, Ben Wade (Russell Crowe); along with Wade’s wicked apprentice, Charlie Prince (Ben Foster), who revered his boss with starry-eyed devotion.
The story unwound as revelation after revelation unfurled. Good moral men and solid citizens shirked their duties and retreated in the face of evil in order to save their own lives. But one man, alone, initially marched onward for the sake of his family, and then made the ultimate sacrifice for what was right; and solely for what was right.
In the film, Russell Crowe superbly portrayed the evil Ben Wade as an urbane gentlemen-devil, always challenging, teasing, and tempting. Then, when the time was right, he killed for his own sake. Wade was courteously brutal, and a lady’s man, who even quoted the Bible at times. He was, in fact, charming; and even likable in his twisted way.
The ethos of the fictional Ben Wade got me to thinking.
If morality was truly relative in a random universe, then proficient practically would, in turn, represent the highest of ideals, would it not? Therefore, on either an individual or group basis, the ultimate value of practically would naturally manifest in surviving dire circumstances and getting what one wants in all other scenarios.
In other words, in every scene, the end would justify the means.
I believe this type of morality can be seen today in the concept of taqiyya in Islam where lying to the heathens is condoned as a just act. Within the modern Democratic Party, however, the practicality is evidenced as hypocrisy. For example, liberal politicians, like Eric Swalwell (D-CA), openly feign concern for children, yet deny them armed protection in their schools; even though the congressman is safely surrounded by armed security within his taxpayer-subsidized office.
In a recent interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Congressman Swalwell asked:
“Why do you need an AR-15 to protect your house?”
To which Tucker replied:
“I don’t know, why do you need one? You have them in your building where you work.”
Of course such hypocrisy is shameful but there is, also, a more complete type of evil where subterfuge and dissimulation are considered unnecessary in the bold descent towards hell. In the film, 3:10 to Yuma, Ben Wade was such a man. He saw no need for demurs, or equivocation, or masquerades. He simply killed who he wanted, took what he wanted, and satisfied his own demands with a wry smile and consummate skill. Always one step ahead in nearly every situation, he also toyed with those around him in cat and mouse ways.
In the random universe, Wade was undefeated. He was the most corrupt in a corrupt world and, therefore, by that standard, he had no equal; all others were mere pikers and wannabes. Unsurpassed brutality was the means by which Wade remained top dog in a pack of the most violent hellhounds to ever have raged upon the fictional landscape of the old, Wild West.
Nevertheless, when the cripple, Dan Evans, later confronted Wade in a saloon, the farmer demanded what he was owed and more. Five dollars more, to be exact. And when Wade inquired as to what the extra five bucks was for, Christian Bale, playing Dan Evans, replied with one of the best lines ever delivered in film.
He said: “For making me nervous.”
And thus began an onscreen dialogue, and a moral tale, masterfully effectuated by the actors Christian Bale and Russell Crowe in their respective roles.
As the story ticked forward like a clock, the arch-criminal Wade first challenged and taunted the plain-spoken Evans, then presented temptations to the farmer that would have legitimately benefitted both him and his family. In every instance, Evans refused, even on the occasions when the evil Wade had the upper hand and the stakes were life and death.
In the example of Wade, what first began as curiosity about Evans later became intrigue, then fascination, and then, the outlaw seemed even mesmerized by the example of a crippled man who loved his family more than life; and, in the end, what was right above all else.
There are some uncompromised values that override all forms of practically on earth. Ultimately, these values comprise a code of morality that, for some, transcends even life and death; and of which the gates of hell shall not prevail.
Today, in the real world, the old ways are still present and the dark powers, like cornered animals, may soon choose to trigger some sort of “nuclear option” in a plot gimmick designed to consolidate their power and save their collective asses.
Regardless, the culminating conclusion of any climax will commence upon the countervailing action, or inaction, of common people.
What allegorical sounds, and shades, and colors will they perceive?
Even now, there are those speaking out, and in plain language, at the illegalities. A former advisor to both President Clinton and Hillary Clinton recently wrote that Robert Mueller must be stopped in order to protect us all. A columnist and practicing attorney from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania additionally penned an article, this week, on how the FBI and CIA restarted the Cold War to protect themselves.
In the instances of internet and media sensations where science plays tricks on the mind, the stakes don’t matter; so it’s all in good fun.
Conversely, in today’s geopolitics the stakes could not matter more. And the choices are moral.
For some people, right is right, and in the end, it actually becomes an altar upon which all else will be sacrificed. In Latin, this was understood as fiat justitia ruat cælum, which translates as follows:
Let justice be done though the heavens fall.
In the random universe, victory resides within the hearts and minds of those most committed.
“In the random universe, victory resides within the hearts and minds of those most committed.”
True that.
The problem is that “random”ness does not exist anymore. Take a look at any episode of the modern day “Price is Right”….statistics and probability are being eliminated from reality as well. We should already be aware of that from election results in certain districts.
The Price is Right?
If these top government criminals are not prosecuted and jailed, then the rule of law will be laid bare as a farce for all to see, but only some will see. Plan accordingly.
You’re so right. It will prove that the communists have infiltrated not only the MSM, Hollywood, and our schools/universities, but the entire federal government… Chip
Oh and great work Doug… Chip
Some things are self evident until they get distorted by overthinking and over analyzing them and end up seeming like they could be something different.
Or you just might be stupid and cowardly for missing the obvious fucking point and then posting anonymously?
Fuck off if you can’t present a different view and show me why mine is wrong.
He did. You were just too stupid to realize it.
Nice writing Doug. I love the way you slide from point to point taking us on a ride that always stays on the tracks. Even among us bubble riders here at TBP you will see different interpretations of what you wrote and this all comes down to, just as you point out, the fact that we are all just brains in a bone box. We all have to form our own opinion about the reality around us and can only act on that opinion. In as much as our realities are all different, our conclusions are going to be different as well.
So yes, as you concluded, morality is fluid. We each see it differently. We tend to cluster around others who generally see the reality around them as we see the reality around us, but we can never actually see the interpretation of reality that another person sees. We can only see the reality that they say that they see and those are two very different things. That is why we have a word “fiction” with the opposite word being “non-fiction”. In a just world with one reality and not 7 billion realities, we would have a word “fact” and the opposite would be “non-fact”. This is why our fictions are so important to us. They give us the illusion of showing us what someone is actually thinking. That is, of course, completely untrue. It is a fiction after all.
The morality that you seek. The right for rights sake. It only exists in your mind, based on your experience. You empathize with a fictional morality because it closely matches your own. When the match is close you are satisfied. When it is very different, you are offended. So the film makers try to make a film that sits comfortably within the boundaries of what they have learned is the general view of morality that the majority of brains in bone boxes have most likely come to include in their vision of reality. When they succeed they make a lot of money and you are happy because your view of reality from within your own bone box has been validated. But others, with other moral teachings or other life experiences will see the fiction differently.
You conflation of the yanny with the morality of those who see reality as different from the way you see reality is exactly correct and very well stated. The insight that I take from your comparison is that you shouldn’t be surprised when democrats cheat and lie. You know that republicans cheat and lie so why wouldn’t they.
If you want to play football you have to first learn the rules, then get big and strong, and then spend the entire game right on the edge of those rules. If you don’t get right up to the boundary between the established rules and the flagrant violations you are giving ground to your opponent. This is precisely what you are seeing in washington today. They play the game of thrones to win. Their brains in their bone boxes have found a way to benefit in the game by playing right up to, and where they can just over, the boundaries of the rules. Where that boundary might be can not be determined as it is a negotiated boundary between brains in bone boxes and is therefore vague by it’s very nature. This frustrates us all as we can’t see the rules and would like to think that the rules are fixed, but they are not. They are negotiated and to a certain extent agreed upon.
I love the way you use different perception examples to show how they relate to the machinations that we see in washington, and our own states and cities. We think that the rules are fixed; some would say by god himself, but they are not. As you so carefully point out.
Well done sir.
“So yes, as you concluded, morality is fluid.”
That’s what you got out of reading the article?
Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you are unable to accept My message. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out his desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, refusing to uphold the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, because he is a liar and the father of lies.…
Take a break brother. I can smell your brain smokin’ all the way over here. I’m not slammin’ you. But you need to ease up; don’t take it so seriously or personal.
Your father is the DEVIL????
Ho Lee Shit, man. I gotta meet you for a beer some time.
Yay, I get to use my favorite clip again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ve_ylvALnN0
The lava coming out of the Hawaii volcano is fluid too, just like this worlds morals.
And this world of homosexuals, adulterers, feminists and abortionists are going to experience it from numerous angles.
Liked your comment, Rob. I responded, in part, below.
The US govt is the biggest terrorist organization in the world. But they are doing it for you. (Adding sarc tag here in case of dimwits.)
Silence means consent for rainbirds but not songbirds (Adding sarc tag here in case of dimwits.)
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-05-22/their-lives-were-ruined-victims-cia-mk-ultra-brainwashing-plan-class-action-suit
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-05-22/flood-coming-new-comey-mccabe-emails-suggest-cnn-and-fbi-coordination-over-steele
I’m doing my little part to help bring down the system. However, I never put anything even vaguely self incriminating in writing. That would be plain stupid, begging your pardon.
In Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge executed lots of “intellectuals” – people who merely wore glasses.
Where do you plan to hide?
Uncola,
I have wondered lately if what we are witnessing is less a battle between right and wrong and more a battle between order and disorder.
The world appears to me to be in the midst of being ‘reordered’ and saved from disorder (slowly and painfully but surely). Whether or not we emerge into a better world or not remains to be seen (that’s the nature of 4th turnings right?). Right now events have the appearance of moving towards righteousness. But truthfully, who knows for sure at this stage?
We COULD end up with a world that none of us really imagined….
Brilliant point, FM. It could be Trump came in like a wrecking ball and the old foundations are falling so a New Order can rise. Perhaps the train is running right on schedule.
There’s a lot of different takes on this symbol. Some are not so good.
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The problem is until the story plays itself out we don’t get to know where we are truly headed. Gears are in motion right now that are completely beyond our power to control. The cards will not be back in our hands for some time at this stage (if they ever were). So we watch. We understand. We wait. And we remain prepared.
What else can you do?
I think we have reached peak centralization and it is becoming evident to more and more people everyday that we are over centralized and that system has failed/is failing “we the people”. My two cents… Chip
Right…….or Wrong. Primal, needing no further explanation. A goodly percentage of people can discern it. As the movie illustrates, a quite small percentage are willing to stand up for it at all costs. This existential phenomena cannot be spoken of often enough. Thanks for this tightly written essay.
Doug, that was a beautifully written piece. Bravo sir.
Locally, a community council passed legislation that would fine the parents of a “bully” $400 for each incident. The very next report on the local news was how illegal immigrants marching through the city were being harassed by “citizens” …. how could these people, reporting this, not have sunburn from the glaring bipolar dichotomy? Uncola, you have hit the proverbial nail on the head. I am perplexed as to how even the most miniscule bit of “common sense” has been vaporized from society. This is an epidemic worse than any viral disease, including the lame stream media.
TacoTaco, don’t take this in the wrong way. I support you opinion but want to suggest that you perhaps missed Doug’s central thesis. Your common sense is not everyone’s common sense. It is just yours based on your life experiences. This is where the frustration comes from. Your common sense is not their common sense. Your morality is not their morality.
This is the fundamental reason why multiculturalism can’t work. You can’t take two cultures with two common senses and mix them together. There has to be conflict as the two different visions of right and wrong are worked out. That’s what makes Doug’s article so insightful.
I understand the fundamentals…otherwise why comment here?…but my point is there is not an iota of “common sense” as defined by our founding fathers anywhere…I fear it has been lost forevermore…It is gone…and alas, why we find ourselves going over the cliff a la “Thelma and Louise”…forgive me for my hopeful outlook…
It is EVERYWHERE – the MSM simply refuses to report it.
Every time a man draws a gun to DEFEND his family from a home invasion; every time a father advises his daughter NOT to get involved with a “bad boy”; every time a mother tells her son to respect women by waiting for marriage himself; the learnings and culture of our ancestors comes alive.
It isn’t “sexy”, it isn’t “heroic” and it isn’t “exciting”; but it’s there.
But for all the things it ISN’T, it DOESN’T make the evening news – where “if it bleeds, it leads”.
You just have to look harder, closer to home.
As much as I would like to see it happen, and the tree of liberty is in real need of a good watering, I seriously doubt anyone of note will go down as a result of their many crimes. The swamp is far deeper and the denizens dug in way too much for any real reckoning to occur. In the end I fear it will be business as usual in the palace of the lords.
We are standing at a pivotal point of history, the go along to get along with whoever happens to be in power has finally come to a head; an epic battle approaches where order and justice for all will try to vanquish disorder and the injustice; where justice is only available for those who could afford it.
The battle lines are being drawn as we write, but with the muddling of the MSM, I’m not sure if the opposing viewpoints of the combatants will be grasped by the American public.
This is what makes me nervous, the spin and slight of hand is so heavy, I am afraid the true evil will be hidden from sight and the fight will be over meaningless decoys that will decimate America, with the evil rising again from the disorder that was brought on by a war fought over trivial insults.
I hope that the patriots will be able to remain focused and not be given to waging war over petty arguments; a real possibility when the lines of communication are disrupted as we are presently witnessing. At stake is a resetting of society; a sunrise over a new constitutional republic, for, of and by the people, or a sunset of the elites finally conquering the lovers of freedom to form their own version of 1984.
Not Sure,
Your sunrise and sunset descriptions address the concerns (& photo) posted by Mario above; as well as a question I have posted at the end of previous essays:
What type of phoenix will rise from the ashes of our now burning Bretton-Woods financial system?
Before a new world order can be established, the United States Constitution must fall. However there are millions of armed patriots willing to defend their inalienable rights.
At the same time, we now approach a financial reckoning in this country that could very swiftly descend into every man for himself.
Perhaps these facts explain why the state seems to be growing increasingly hungry for John Q’s semi-automatic rifles and large capacity magazines.
Now consider the math behind gun confiscation as described in this article:
https://survivalblog.com/mathematics-countering-tyranny/
Given that, it becomes concievable (barring any bona fide “nuclear options”) that the wise play for the globalists would be to declare martial law on the rest of the world while allowing the former USofA to descend into anarchy.
Unless they truly want to try and establish an Orwellian state within our borders.
Either way, we can hope for the sunrise but, at the same time, we should prepare for the sunset and the long dark (and cold) night that could inevitably ensue.
Your writings always cause me to expand my thinking to prepare for what is coming. The Phoenix is a great illustration, I only wonder if it will be one lifetime or ten lifetimes before we (or our seed) will see its rising.
Doug, excellent and inspiring writing.
Anyone confused by moral relativism (as some of the commenters seem to be) need only read the first few dozen pages of Locke’s Second Treatise. There is such a thing as objective good, and it is to be found in the rights and safety and liberty of the innocent.
I’m grateful for the time I’ve had to emotionally, physically and spiritually prepare.
Hey 7Up – I mean Uncola;
I enjoyed the article but need to point out the fact that we haven’t had a Bretton-Woods financial system since 1971.
I particularly appreciated the lead in with the Laurel and Yanny debate because it really does boil down to the fact that there always seems to be the same to duals. Not opposites, per say, but duals. Magnetism and electricism are not opposites of each other but duals of each other. The same for positive and negative charges. So goes the world around us. I have learned not to get frustrated trying to converse with liberal acquaintances since our understandings are so different. It seems that they will never get ‘it’ and they believe the same with me. And so I take it to be the same with the wheat and the tares; and so swings the pendulum. I truly believe that the morality issue is at the core.
The reference to William Cooper shook me to my bones. I used to listen to him Monday through Thursday nights until he was murdered for trying to wake people up. Everyone should read “Behold a Pale Horse”.
A free PDF download can be found here:
https://wrathoftheawakenedsaxon.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/behold-a-palehorse-william-cooper.pdf
Thank you.
Technically, the original Bretton Woods ended at the Nixon Shock, but the current petrodollar system (that continued after the end of convertibility) is commonly referred to as Bretton Woods 2.
Thank you for your comment, Doc, kind words, and the PDF link. I appreciate it very much.
The MSM is the single greatest threat to our individual freedom and liberty and ultimately our country. Ultimately they create the two separate realities… Chip
Doug, you wrote an important piece that should be read by many from all realities. Sadly it will probably not. The one point you missed from the film was that of Bale’s son. His was, at the beginning of the film, a path destined to be parallel to the Ben Foster character. In the end his father’s sacrifice was for his son’s redemption which was masterfully portrayed. Hopefully that idea can manifest in our reality as well.
Oldwyd – In case you check back, I wanted you to know that I responded to your phenomenal perspicacity in my comment below. Thank you
“In pondering both of these viral online and media curiosities by which people listened to, and viewed, the same things – yet heard, and saw, them in such diverse ways, I began to wonder if similar anomalies could be occurring within partisan politics today; and if these might not even be anomalies at all.” ———– article
There is no anomaly. It is pure blind partisanship (on both sides, really). Let me explain.
I wonder what the distribution is regarding laurel vs yanny; 50/50 … 60-40 … 70-30? Regarding the dress color I read some of the comments and it seems to be relatively even. But, in either case it is definitely NOT 95% vs 5%.
An anomaly is simply a deviation from the Norm. But, HOW MUCH can it deviate and still be considered an anomaly? What if it deviates 100%? Well, that’s no longer an anomaly, that IS the norm.
Here’s what I’m getting at … let’s use CuNNt vs Trump as an example. Let’s assume that a reasonable expectation of unbiased political news reporting would result in a “norm” resulting in roughly a 50% positive vs. 50% negative distribution. Seems logical. Hell, I’ll even go as high as 20% positive vs 80% negative, and still consider it the norm!
But, even that doesn’t help CuNNt as I believe their negative stories about Trump are 90% plus. That’s unnatural no matter how you look at it. No way in hell are they “reporting” things as they really see it but with eyes different than ours. Put it another way; if you flip a coin 100 times and it lands on either heads or tails 95 times …. are you really going to deny that coin is weighted? Of course you won’t. Neither will anyone convince me (not that you are!) that CuNNt is anything but a bunch of biased, dishonest, partisan, hateful, lying sack of shit Deep State Whores.
Wait. I’m not done. Fux Newz isn’t beyond similar criticism … since 90% plus of their Trump coverage is positive. Is that normal? No. Are you really getting much truth? Nope. They’re just as Whorish as the other guys. But, they’re MY whores … so, I sometimes put up with their blowing smoke up my ass (I really like Tucker Carlson).
Stucky, there is nothing in statistics that precludes the heads result 95 times out of 100. You don’t need crooked flips to get that result. It can happen, the chances of it happening are really low, but not zero. But your point about cnn and fox is spot on. Well said.
Tucker is a truth seeker not a partisan and that’s his appeal… Chip
“If morality was truly relative in a random universe, then proficient practically would, in turn, represent the highest of ideals, would it not? ” ———— article
What place is there for morality — be it relative or absolute — in a truly random universe?
A spider randomly kills and eats a fly. A frog kills the spider. A bird kills the frog. A snake kills the bird. A mongoose kills the snake. There is no morality in any of this. All of nature is red in tooth and claw.
Of course, we humans think of ourselves as special. We are above a fly, spider, frog, bird, snake, or mongoose. We have a frontal cortex. So, when a man randomly kills another man, our frontal cortex raises the issue of morality. But, if I’m here by random accident, and you’re here by random accident, than what does morality have to do with anything (including the taking of your random life)?
Of course, if the universe is ordered … I might have different questions and/or answers.
“What place is there for morality — be it relative or absolute — in a truly random universe?”
“Of course, if the universe is ordered … I might have different questions and/or answers.”
Do you think it is random?
“Do you think it is random?” ——— Francis Marion
“Nothing in Nature is random. … a thing appears random only through the incompleteness of our knowledge.” ——- (Baruch Spinoza, 1632–1677)
But, quantum mechanics is all about randomness. Light may be both a particle and wave simultaneously but you can’t know more than one physical property (position, momentum,..) at the same time (Heisenberg). Radioactive decay is random as you can never know which particle quantum will tunnel into or out of the nucleus.
In other words, I’m not sure. Maybe when we finally discover The Theory Of Everything we’ll discover it’s both.
I know if I say “ordered” then the whole question of God-no god will inevitably arise. And I’m not in the right state of mind to get into that right now. So, I’ll keep my leanings (guesses, really) to myself for the time being.
Good response.
RE: Stucky’s Spinoza quote above
In the Rolling Stone piece on John McCain that was posted today on TBP, the author, Matt Taibbi, wrote that Sarah Palin made Dan Quayle look like Spinoza.
Another coincidence in the random universe, right there. Or, “agreement” according to Don Juan by way of Carlos Castaneda.
Is quantum mechanics real? I have no idea. People who seem smarter than me say it is. Noticeably, an awful lot of them seem to be jews. I find myself doubting much nowadays, and quantum mechanics is no exception. Newtonian is clearly correct, my own experience bears it out. Experience doesn’t bear out the holocaust, or quantum mechanics, or many other things, I’m just dependent on other peoples’ words for those. So I doubt them.
On a different note, I picked up from some of Rory Miller’s writings (eg “Meditations on Violence”) that charm is a verb. Very important point. When a Crowe-type character seems charming, it is because he IS charming, as in, the verb. Just like he chooses to eat, or drink, or jump, he is choosing to charm you. The question must always be, why? Why is he charming me? The default answer must be, to get something he wants. When men are thought charming by attractive young women, it is obvious why. When wealthy widows find a young banker charming, that’s pretty clear too. When a random black fella in the street spins you a charming line of BS, that should be obvious…but it’s often not, coz scruples or something get in the way. Anyway, the point is, if someone is charming he is choosing to be charming, for a reason. So take care.
Until now, I always considered “charming” an adjective. Until now.
From henceforth, until the end of my days, “charming” will be a verb. My worldview has been updated; simply because I posted an article on a blog.
Thanks SD
That had the same effect on me. Simple, but a profound insight.
Rory Miller’s books are worth a look.
You have obviously not had the pants charmed off you.
Recently here “the talk” on taki site was pointed out. I read it and saved it for future grandkids. I too stay away from high concentrations of them.
I think I read that when they split a photon, the intensity of the light also split.
I was in the garage, the roof is some 30 feet above. Near the top, the sheet metal has several holes ranging in size from a dime to a dollar coin. There was a faint spot of light on the ground one winter morning. I wanted to know which hole it came from. I looked up and moved into the path of the light ray. When I found the tiny hole where the weakest ray was coming from, a brilliant shower of sparkles like glints from a diamond poured into my lone eye. I could only stand to look at it for half a second but it was a lovely sight.
Yes, it does sound like I have one eye. The fact is that the light poured into the only eye I used. Very clever of you to use that a a religious experience. Where were you when I needed an interpreter for my dream? No need, though.
The dream meant that since I found myself inside Admin;s house, it was this place. He is a welcoming fellow, very nice but Admin ain’t got time to chit-chat like we have. I found myself outside his house and it was a poor picture devoid of people, everything. That’s my view of people, they are 2 dimensional, at least not as multi-faceted and profound as people here can be.
Seeing isn’t everything EC.
I have a pal who has a picture of a dog in his bathroom with a caption that says: “I know a good friend when I smell one.”
I accept your complement… or is it a compliment? I forget as I rarely get either.
Randomness in quantum mechanics is a mathematical representation of things which we have no capability of knowing. It is philosophically no different from a belief in god…any god which you might chose. And this then leads us to a discussion of mathematics and whether it exists. I disagree with one point that this guy makes, but in general I can’t say that he is wrong. The bit about Pi is where he claims that you can’t relate Pi to a thing, but of course you can. It is the relationship between the radius of a circle and the circumference. So any thing that is round is a thing that is represented by Pi.
Wow. Love the comments so far. So many execellen perspectives. Rather than responding to each one in succession above, I want to combine them into my following comment thusly:
Rob –
You say “morality is fluid” and that “we can never actually see the interpretation of reality that another person sees”, and then describes “fiction” and “non-fiction”, and “facts”, as being relative in nature.
If I am misinterpreting your contentions, Rob, I apologize in advance and await your clarifications.
In the meantime – Given the fact that we do NOT have 7 billion completely differing realities, but actual consensus on the interpretation of select “undisputable certainties” (for lack of a better terminology), would that not, then, imply a foundational reality (i.e. truth) beyond our interpretations? And, if that is the case, than perhaps and fiction and facts are not relative and morality is not fluid after all?
Regarding the “3:10 to Yuma” filmmakers making the film “comfortably within the boundaries” of the general (learned) “view of morality”, you may want to see the film because to most people, it would appear that evil won in the end.
When you say:
In the film, there is a Pinkerton who is tough-as-nails and seemingly a good man. However, the evil Ben Wade reveals how the Pinkerton has killed Indian women and children which, seemingly, demonstrated to the viewer Wade’s point that the lines are fuzzy; and if the lines are fuzzy, then perhaps the lines are in our imaginations after all. And, if that was the case, then wouldn’t that make practicality the highest ideal within the random universe?
Which brings me to Stucky’s question:
Bingo. That IS the irony, is it not?
And finally, Oldwyd says:
Truthfully, I wanted to focus on the dichotomies between the fictional Dan Evans and Ben Wade in an ontological quest for answers regarding morality. However, you point out, perhaps, a most (in not the most) important ideological abstraction of all. It is this: There is no greater good than to lay down one’s life for another. I believe this what had the arch-criminal , Ben Wade, so mesmerized in the film “3:10 to Yuma”. He had not seen that before in all of his experience.
Which raises the question regarding Moral Realism:
Perhaps morals only become real when one is prepared to die for them?
Pursuant to the last line of the above piece, that’s commitment.
Bingo, Uncola. That is the response to the moral relativists I was too lazy to make. Thanks, and well done.
In the end we all die for our morality, don’t we?
What is it’s source, that’s the real question.
Yes sir.
“What place is there for morality — be it relative or absolute — in a truly random universe?”
Morality is how we survive and grow in a random universe. Does anyone truly not understand this?
The moral relativists want to drag us down some path of uncertainty and confusion…SO THEY CAN WIN. “Yes but what about this or that special case?”
Locke is unequivocal:
The State of Nature has a law of nature govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions
Every one, as he is bound to preserve himself, and not to quit his station wilfully, so by the like reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another.
And that all men may be restrained from invading others rights, and from doing hurt to one another, and the law of nature be observed, which willeth the peace and preservation of all mankind, the execution of the law of nature is, in that state, put into every man’s hands, whereby every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that law to such a degree, as may hinder its violation: for the law of nature would, as all other laws that concern men in this world ‘be in vain, if there were no body that in the state of nature had a power to execute that law, and thereby preserve the innocent and restrain offenders. And if any one in the state of nature may punish another for any evil he has done, every one may do so: for in that state of perfect equality, where naturally there is no superiority or jurisdiction of one over another, what any may do in prosecution of that law, every one must needs have a right to do.
/
Be mindful: when the rule of fails, we revert to the state of nature, and if you trangress I will punish you. Moral relativists should be very careful what they wish for.
“…when the rule of law fails…”
The internet is fun
“Perhaps morals only become real when one is prepared to die for them?”
Basically an advanced version of “skin in the game”?
I’m the one who responded earlier with the quote from John 8 that I (unfortunately) thought would be understood in context of Jesus’s larger conversation, except nobody know the context anymore because nobody knows the Bible anymore — NOT meant as a slur but it’s like quoting Shakespeare, it only works if the audience is already familiar with the play.
So longer paraphrasing of Jesus saying, “Your father is the devil” — what Jesus was railing about were those people who professed to believe that they were moral people, only doing the “right” thing — but their “morality” was relative to their society, i.e. they professed to believe in God and hold to a moral standard but they were just saying they were moral to feel better about themselves.
Interesting to see this posted today:
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/bill-dagostino/2018/05/23/what-changed-same-media-who-excuse-bob-mueller-abused-ken-starr
I don’t know what it says about me but I heard Laurel when it was broadcast on the radio and I heard yanny when I happened to come across it online. The dress is also a problem. I saw lavender and gold. I always have to be contrary, it seems.
There is so much going on in your essay, that I will have to read it again to really be able to communicate all the thoughts that ran across my apparently messed up brain.
Isn’t it reality that never changes, just our perception of reality is different?
When each person does what is right in their own eyes, we are in for a heap of trouble.
That was a very thought provoking essay. I will think about it while I am painting a piece of furniture I am re-purposing for my bath vanity.
Why has Trump not withdrawn USA from the UN small arms treaty? Bernie Sanders says thank you. Stop the drills problem solved? 3:10 to Yuma is on TV tomorrow night and set up to record, thanks for that and another home run article.
Liberalism is a mental disease and it may not be any more complicated than that.
Barney – regarding your first question – see my reply to Not Sure above. Could it be?
Doug, I did not say that morality is fluid. I agreed with your contention that morality is fluid. But I can see that I was mistaken and that rather than contending that morality appears to be fluid, you were expressing frustration with the apparent condition, in which morality seems to be fluid. But in the end, yes I would support the contention that morality is a set of societal norms that is not only fluid when looked at within any culture, but becomes even more clearly fluid when one considers the many divergent cultures around the world.
Clearly your morality is at the very least a bit different from that of John McCain or Barack Obama. And they are members of your own society. When you compare your moral assumptions to say the moral assumptions of the Saudis, you see the gap widen. Are you right? Are they right? The philosophy paper you quote is particularly valuable in this regard. In that article the question is posed that not both moral positions can be correct but the writers claim seems to be that one must be correct and the other incorrect. This is not the only condition. It is possible, perhaps even inevitable, that both statements are in fact incorrect. That neither position is true. In other words, you can claim that the morality of the muslim religion is not functionally true, and that your morality is indeed true, but you are basing that contention on your experience of the reality that surrounds you.
I did not say that there are 7 billion realities, although there are a great many realities which are different from yours and mine. I said that there are 7 billion interpretations of reality; one for each of us living here on this lovely little rock in the vast uncaring universe. Morality, if it is to be the rules by which we chose to govern our lives and our interactions with others, is most assuredly fluid unless you chose to ground your morality on the bedrock of a god. If your morality is based in revealed truth from your god then there can be no fluidity accepted. Not for you. Not for the muslims. Not for the jews. Not for anyone who “believes.” But by choosing to ground your morality on the revealed truths you are forced to contend with those who have chosen a different god, and believe in a different revealed truth and thereby a different morality.
So you are still stuck with what I would call a fluid morality. I can’t see how you can look at it in any other way but fluid unless of course you are willing to discard all of the other gods and all of the other moralities.
Let me jump down a bit before coming back to your interpretation of what I wrote;
“and if the lines are fuzzy, then perhaps the lines are in our imaginations after all. And, if that was the case, then wouldn’t that make practicality the highest ideal within the random universe?”
Yes, practicality is most assuredly the highest ideal within any universe. But that is not to say that taking things from other people without their consent is practical. The moral laws within a society are there to ensure that the society can function harmoniously. It is the highest practicality to ensure that you do nothing evil because that is the surest way to minimize the amount of evil things that are done to you. You benefit when the societal rules are adhered to and you lose when the societal rules are broken. This is the source of your discomfort with the ruling class in merika. All beings, not just humans, know when they are getting shafted, and they don’t like it. But that does not mean that anyone’s moral foundations are based in TRUTH. They are based in your truth and they are different from my truths. It is only through negotiation that we come to a moral foundation that we can all live with. Then when you introduce an entire culture who has a completely different moral foundation, and who are unwilling to modify their basic moral belief system, you get killing.
Let me finish by replying to your mention of indisputable certainties and how it relates to fiction. I can’t know what things you might consider as indisputable, so I can’t address them specifically but I do want to say that my understanding of “reality” is incomplete as I am almost certain is yours. Every science is evolving before our eyes. Things that scientists believed to be indisputable just years ago are not not only in dispute, but have been thoroughly debunked. You have seen discussions of these types of things right here on TBP. Was there a big bang? Most cosmologists will say yes today but they really don’t know. Can we travel faster than the speed of light? Nothing does that we know about but we don’t know for sure and if that speed limit is broken then E no longer equals MC2. Was jesus the son of god? How could you possibly know that. You can’t, you must have faith. Is Allah the one true god and Mohamed his profit on earth? You can’t know that either. And yet far more humans believe that last one than believe anything that you hold as indisputable. Their truth is not your truth. Their morality is not your morality. From this, I divine that morality is fluid.
(For any numerologists out there, this comment is number 77).
Rob,
Thanks for your reasoned response and clarifications.
As a rejoinder, I didn’t claim morality was fluid, per se, but in the above piece I did define it as the result of preferences by which people choose.
Although that may appear to represent “fluidity”, I don’t believe it is quite that simple?
The (indirect) questions presented in the above piece (and currently being discussed here in the commentary) are these:
Is it possible moral preferences are predicated upon natural laws that transcend individual interpretations?
If so, could these laws represent the de facto “undisputed certainties” as mentioned in my above comment?
For example, we have eyes that see and ears that hear by way of the natural laws underlying optics and acoustics, respectively. In the case of “The Dress” and “Laurel vs. Yanny”, science explained why different people saw and heard differently and that, in turn, explained the various interpretations.
Regarding morality as a code of conduct, however, we choose based on our preferences.
Plato claimed good government occurred only when leaders had wisdom and virtue but any absence of these qualities “welcomed hell on earth”. The philosopher John Locke claimed human reason and wisdom arrives only via Biblical Distributions from God in the form of fundamental human rights and Law. Furthermore, Locke claimed mankind had the right to acquire property and this allowed him to survive; and property rights required law and without law there could be no Freedom. Thomas Hobbes, in part, somewhat agreed with both Plato and Locke except he seemed to favor a benevolent monarchy in lieu of a tyrannical empire.
Therefore, if there were no foundational natural laws that give rise to morality as a code of conduct, then wouldn’t practicality , in turn, represent the highest ideal in a random universe? And if this were the case, then what would prevent survival of the fittest (i.e. tyranny?) from being the norm across all human societies?
The point of my piece was that any (of what we are now calling) “fluidity” as defined by CHOICE remains in the eyes of the beholders and, perhaps, based upon their interpretation as to the existence of natural law, or “undisputable certainties”.
There are some who CHOOSE to believe in the existence of natural law as the foundation of morality and then are those who believe ALL of it is fluid.
It’s like Forest Gump’s feather. Random relativity as opposed to gravitational order.
There are some who adapt with the wind and others who hold on to their moral preferences unto death because of natural law (i.e. self-evident truth, “undisputable certainties”, science, religion, et al).
And – in the random universe, as I stated above:
In closing, perhaps another (simpler) way to perceive all of that might be to conflate the American flag with morality. To some it represents liberty and justice; but to others, death and injustice. The interpretations may appear fluid – but – by what underlying standards are both interpretations measured? And without an underlying standard, would any of it matter anyway?
Doug, I wrote for over an hour in response to your questions and then somehow managed to delete the entire thing. Let me see if I can reconstruct what I wrote.
Been there. Done that. I hate it when it happens, too.
If it’s over five sentences, write it somewhere else (say, MS Word) and save it. Copy and paste your answer into the comment block. You’ll never lose (permanently) a reply.
It went into the spam filter. I took it out.
No it’s probably spam. You should have left it there.
NOT SPAM. SPAM IS FROM ANIMALS AND NOT WHOLESOME FOR THE POOR IN SPIRIT AND HUMBLE OF HEART. EVEN IF FENCES HAVE POSTS THEN SPAMBLOCKERS REMOVE WHAT WE WON’T SEE.
Doug
One of your best.
Is the problem one of complexity or simplicity? There are certainly complicated moral issues, but it often seems the case that the moral questions are straightforward, and the complexity comes in the rationalizations people use to justify doing the wrong thing.
For instance, there are scads of verbiage justifying the income tax, and scads more that simply assume the “rightness” of the income tax. However, when you get down to it, the income tax is theft, which has been identified as wrong since at least the Ten Commandmants’ injunction against it. It doesn’t make it right because the government does it.
Much of the moral relativism and moral complexity edifice falls apart when you analyze explicit and implicit premises and what actually transpire. It should be no surprise that much of that thinking emanates from governments and their media and academic minions, since most of what they do is so inarguably wrong when viewed in light of the question: Would this be right or wrong if an individual did it?
Moral choices confront each of us every day. If we’re honest with ourselves, the right choice is usually clear, even if we don’t make that choice. Talk of gray areas and complexity becomes a tranquilizer for the moral discomfort we can’t hide from ourselves.
One of the defining features of a Fourth Turning is that it dramatically increases the number of moral choices while also dramatically increasing the difficulty of doing the right thing. It’s far more honest to say the wrong thing was done because the right thing was too hard than to say the choice was so complex that it was impossible to determine the right thing.
Thank you for an article that has provoked my and a lot of other TBPers thoughts. I’ll post it tonight.
Excellent.
There was a female German psychologist who challenged Freud’s views on sexuality. Her name was Karen Horney (ironic, I know). Although a devout feminist she did have a quote I liked that went something like this:
“Rationalization is self-deception by reason.”
Thank you, Robert. I always appreciate your perspectives.
Her name is pronounced Hore Nye according to Doc Pangloss. Wipe that stupid smirk of your face.
I call bullshit : God has put His Moral Law in the ? of every person on this planet . Everybody knows stealing is wrong but we do it anyway. Lying , Killing , adultery and Coveting is wrong but we do it anyway . After all the character in the movie repeatedly reference the Bible. Even Meatballs knows right from wrong and where did Meatballs acquire this knowledge……the Bible . Even Stucky would agree as to where pagans like you get their moral laws and he’s a Meathead but a smart one.
Wait. God put moral law in the emojis of every person on the planet?
Anon was me.
The original movie with Glen Ford and Van Heflin had a different ending…
Or did it? Which one did you hear?
Was it the one where the president is a pathological liar, bully, and narcissist, and moral character doesn’t matter as long as you get what you want, or is it that he’s a noble savior fighting against the hypocrisy of the left? Wait, … which hypocrisy…. who’s the hypocrite? I’ve lost my thought ….
Lloyd must be a moderate.
I have been away for while going through a Satanic initiation in which I actually played with the Devil .I wouldn’t advice doing this as my head is kinda fucked up as a result but I now know more then ever Satan is the God of this WORLD . The people behind this New World Order have completely reversed the roles of both Satan and the Biblical God.They think Satan is the good guy who bought light and secret knowledge to mankind.They see themselves pure and holy in the eyes of Satan and Biblical Christianity must be removed or eliminated as well as all Christians.While we set and talk about Trump These People are planning GENOCIDE
Ninety-four if you wonder why I’m here.
Anonymous was BB .Even my smart phone is fucked up now .I guess I need to repent.
Doug
Excellent piece. I love the imagery being used. I wish I could write moar write now but I am busy building bridges. Well at least the reinforcing bits anyways. Might comment again tonight but for now thanks. It does fold nicely into many things I have been hashing about. One being moral relativism and how it goes hand in hand with smooth execution of conspiracies. One can hope, I guess, for the conspirators to meet this sort of end cuz McCabe, Clinton, Comey et al are not going to face any repercussions in this life.
Anyways thanks for writing this. This song came up in the music stream at my desk. Here is wishing there is a hell. Not sure yet how it applies but I liked this song. Might add to this later but now it is what it is..
Yours In Odin,
RiNS
nkit
sorry to hear news about the bolts. I fell asleep last night when score was 3-0. Always next year…
RiNs, That Nirvana song is one of my favorite songs. Not really a Nirvana fan but they have a few that I like.
If there is no hell, there is no justice and we have to make our own justice and that’s a pretty scary thought because we suck at it.
I think it is safe to say that ALL politicians are corrupt, out for their own interests and don’t give a single fuck about anyone else. Trump has managed to divide the nation into Blue & Red, Liberal & Conservative, Patriot & Heretic, while also creating chaos and mistrust of everything and everyone especially journalism and the rule of law. They are ALL corrupt, they only want power, wealth and re-election. Picking a side and thinking one is better than the other in this shit show is ignorance at its best. Thinking the DNC or GOP actually care about you is only fooling yourself and will leave you disappointed. This 4th tuning is resetting the world and unfortunately for the USA most of the world hates our fucking guts…we are Rome, nothing more than a shadow of the nation we were founded on in process of being destroyed from within via corruption and unsustainable Empire. We can only fail because we have zero credible leadership within our nation and institutions, its a terminal virus that is killing its host.
https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news
Perhaps these deep thoughts from on Jim Jefferies will lend some clarity to my impression of where morality might come from. Of course, he ain’t no John Locke. I like what SWrichmond threw up and I think that we all kinda fall into that camp of thought. Let me summarize. I don’t care what you do as long as you don’t do it to me. We don’t care what you do as long as you don’t do it to us.
Robert Gore wrote:
“Moral choices confront each of us every day. If we’re honest with ourselves, the right choice is usually clear, even if we don’t make that choice. Talk of gray areas and complexity becomes a tranquilizer for the moral discomfort we can’t hide from ourselves.”
Pardon by French but fucking-A, brother. I think this nicely cuts to the chase of the conversation: Whether or not morality is “fluid” or made up or universal or whatever, it *exists*. Sorta like particle/wave duality with light, we can change our definitions to match the experience but in any case we experience light, we experience morality.
What do you do about it?
Not what do you SAY about it, what you DO about it.
If you do what’s right, you know. When you do something wrong — you know. The more time we spend talking about it, the more I suspect we’re just fooling ourselves.
So then, by that definition, morality just “is”.
Like the Dude, it abides.
There is morality and then there is the absence of morality (i.e. immorality).
Or like Francis Marion said at the top of this thread: Order and disorder. (or in the case of Hobbes’ benevolent monarchy versus tyranny – “good order” and “bad order”)
Positive and negative; and all a matter of degree.
One way. Or the other.
I could live with that; as it does make sense.
Now the only thing to be determined is who decides?
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Good thread.
We all contribute to the decision if we are free people. If we are not free people then we do not get to decide. Either way, the decision is always a personal one for each of us. Just because you make the moral choice, based on your societies moral code, does not mean that you yourself will benefit. The moral code just means that if most people in a society follow the same moral code, most or the people in that society will benefit.
But many societies with very strong moral codes have been trampled into the dust by people with completely different moral codes. This brings us back around to your conclusion that “victory resides within the hearts and minds of those most committed.” I would only add that strength and commitment will pretty much always triumph over weakness and lack of commitment.
the right choice is usually clear… Not really!
The world isn’t Black and White but shades of grey…
I read this the other day and immediately remembered a video I watched few years back.
So I disagree with Robert Gore, Ozymango and many others…. Often the right choice is not even the lesser of two evils. Sometimes it is just evil, period. This video is a bit long but it is a very good lecture. Folds nicely into this thread… and its essence…
Sad to say but honesty does not pay. Often it impedes a career. Being a borderline psychopath/sociopath is what pays. Always has always will. These Students at Harvard will soon go out into world.
Maybe they will be a CEO at Tesla. Deciding to put a Lithium battery in floor directly under passengers knowing full well that some will die horrific deaths in fires after a crash.
Maybe they will be a Nurse. Doing triage in ER and has to decide who requires help first. Knowing full well that others will die waiting.
Maybe they will work as an Engineer. Designing bridges knowing full well that guard rail being omitted, because of expense, will someday result in death of someone unfortunate.
Moral dilemmas inevitability come and when they arrive most get lucky.
No one dies. Psychopathy and sociopathy is the grease on the wheels of moral relativism.
Those unlucky find the spectrum of Moral relativism wavers. What happens when one has to decide the right thing to do. Find that doing the wrong thing sometimes is the best thing. McCabe, Comey, Brennan and Mueller have made their pact. There moral relativism will remain intact. Shaken maybe but they will not be stirred. Truth will be dammed. Then the lessons will be blurred.
Sometimes the cost/benefit analysis gets the fat man pushed off the bridge.
When that happens no sleep will be lost from the critters in the swamp.
So for me it isn’t a choice between Laurel and Yanny. The lyrics may change but as always the Song remains the Same.
Rob, you know I bear you no ill will, but I think that the video from Harvard is exactly why this country is so fucked up. This asshole stands in front of a bunch of clueless kids and hypothesizes a bullshit story to make a retarded point. I hope it gets better, but based on the way it starts I kinda doubt it.
Robs,
I only heard about a third and, even then, was listening at my desk in the background while focusing primarily upon other various undertakings – but it appears the “bullshit” scenarios were designed to demonstrate the differences between consequentialist and categorical moral reasoning.
I found myself questioning if the former construct could help to explain liberal “outcome-based” morality and if the latter might align more with conservative views regarding natural law and individual rights.
I wasn’t planning to listen to it all but found myself becoming increasingly engaged before having to stop-the-tape, so to speak.
Perhaps I will finish it sometime over the long weekend.
HR you are not offending me by calling the scenarios presented being bullshit. because they are…This guy is after all dealing with college kids that have had no real world experience. While pushing fat guys off bridges might seem out of bounds and a bit ridiculous there are plenty real world examples of places where costs get weighed against the greater good.
Bridges I have worked on have been redesigned by order of the bean counters to save money but end up making the structure more dangerous. A couple of wrecks on a sharp turn getting onto bridge will only suck for the poor schlep who drives over it and hits an icy patch some early morning on way to work. I drive over it everyday and do sometimes wonder when it will happen…
Not really fucked up just the way things are. People dying, getting maimed or just fucked over is just the cost of doing business. But yeah Uncola it does expose the weakness of the liberal mindset.
What I took from it, for what it is worth, is that randomness is the square peg and Justice is the round hole. And Liberals fretting about equality of outcome end up the dog doing circles while chasing its tail…
After viewing it does, indeed, appear (according to Michael Sandel, Political Philosopher Extraordinaire, from Harvard University) that “consequentialist” moral reasoning represents ulititarianism, or as I have speculated in my piece: “proficient practicality as the highest ideal in a random universe”.
“Categorical” moral reasoning, however, derives more from the perspective of natural law giving rise to individual rights.
Thanks for posting, RiNS. You were right in that it did “fold nicely into this thread”; and I am gratified to have it posted here in perpetuity and for impartially philisophic purposes of prospective posterity.
Moral relativism causes us to turn a blind eye against all kinds of evil. That is why we are in the state that we are in, now. Living in a country that has caused all kinds of disruptions all over the world, all the while claiming we have the moral high ground.
It’s why no one cares to comment much when Yohimbo posts something about human trafficking.
It’s the reason why we allow abortions on demand and there is now a push to allow “post-birth abortions”.
It’s why feminists turn a blind eye to FGM and even will defend it if you push them.
It’s why the Hindu practice of seti, or widow burning is still being done in India now and then, even though the British outlawed it for a while when India was a colony.
I could go on and on but you get the idea.
Uncola, did you know you can still listen to Bill Cooper on youtube?
I happened to come across one where he broadcast for 8 hours on Sept 11. I thought, “Well, this might be interesting” and it’s worth listening to if you have a day where you can just plug it in and listen while you are doing mundane chores. It’s got some glitches and you have to fast forward through some repeats here and there. He predicted that our whole world would change and we could kiss freedom goodbye after that day and he was right on the money.
I found my copy of his book recently, when I was unpacking after moving. I need to read it again.
One more thing before I turn in,
“Today, in the real world, the old ways are still present and the dark powers, like cornered animals, may soon choose to trigger some sort of “nuclear option” in a plot gimmick designed to consolidate their power and save their collective asses.”
Hmmm, maybe “disclosure”? The close encounters kind?
Very good comment, MC. Am really enjoying this back to nature stuff and have dropped another ten to twenty pounds. I could have made weigh-in in the USAF this past month. I let an old AF pal know that I broke the “pound barrier”… is a term she and I used for that perfect weight we wanted recorded on our military weigh-in record. Mine was a full ten pounds under my Max Allowable Weight, because growing up as a midwest farmer’s daughter, I liked meat, potatoes and lots of homemade bread and butter. Since I could toss hay when I needed to, I had a lot of muscle on my frame and always was on the “five pound club” list to weigh in every single month. Heaven forbid you weigh in a pound or two OVER. Then, it was mandatory physical fitness class for a while.
Military life has some real stupid aspects. The physical standards thing was one of them.
” Am really enjoying this back to nature stuff and have dropped another ten to twenty pounds.”
10 to 20 is a Yuge range!!
Two pastors meet at a prayer convention. One pastor brags “I have 500 people in my flock!”. The other pastor plays the my-weenie-is-bigger-than-yours game and says “Well, I have between eight and nine hundred!”. Later, the pastor’s wife asks, “bb, why did you lie about having between eight and nine hundred followers when you only have 30?” And Pastor bb says, “Because 30 IS between 8 and 900!”
You remind me of Pastor bb.
Am thinking I should update my photo. I am from the Show Me State, you know.
97, by the way. Have scheduled a date to watch 3:10 to Yuma with my husband.
Bill Cooper , is the man !He warned us about the evil behind the new world order they are trying to impose upon the rest of us.Well worth listening to him.
Am scheduling a day to listen to that… I think it will offer interesting perspective.
This is 100 or 101. Either way, I’ve got to get back outside and distribute compost tea. The recipe involves bunny poo, grass clippings and lots of things that squirm and wriggle. But the blooms on my plants and bushes are amazing.
Yaaay. 100 comments. A homesteading soul sister showed some commitment and got it done. If only EC were there, he would have seen it all with his lone eye and exclaimed with a wink: 🙂
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Dude, you confuse me with my deep sea diver. I was willing to sacrifice one eye for the sake of science, not both. My momma dint raise no fool.
Haha… I thought I posted this image a few days back. To be honest, I get busy out here in paradise and forget to upload images. Imagine that! Maggie NOT uploading pictures of the new chickens and rabbits. Yes, I have a new litter of bunnies. Three breeders and four nuggets in processing.
Bunny nuggets…
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I got a kick out of adding the arrow. I knew it would irritate you know who.
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I need to change the image size don’t I? Lemme see where that button might be.
You know maggie, it would be real nice if you took this stuff and wrote an article of your own with it. It’s not that we don’t care, we love your bunny picks, but this was a serious discussion of a really good article until bunny poo dropped.
It’s all in good fun, HR. There are many paths to enlightenment and philosophers find meaning in various ways:
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What a fucking party pooping heathen, fuck you meathead. Traditionally “Hollywood” is a moniker we add as an insult.
Barney Google, we know. Rob was a good sport to adopt that since moran was taken by you.
HR, serious discussion gets derailed all the time on here. You can always be the switchman and pull it back in.
That’s what she said
Mind in the gutter? You are a mess, sir.
It’s a joke that was old when my supervisor used it frequently in 1977. He also would ask, if I accidentally smacked him, “What the fuck? Over.”
Am I really a mess? Perhaps.
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My wife and I do not have sex (age and stuff) but on nights like this when the moon is full, I kid with her. ‘It’s a full moon, I should like to know if you grow a bush.’
‘All you need to do is ask me, I would know if I did or not.’
‘Yes but I want to see a before and after, a sparse landscape today and a wooly bear tomorrow.’
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I asked her if she would like to go to Morongo on Sat to avoid the travelers coming back on Monday. I took her to Agua Caliente where the paintings on the walls look like Maggie’s Fire Lake painting. There were about a dozen people at the ticket booth and I approached two middle-age dudes.
Excuse me, sir, what show are you going to watch?
Pat Benatar.
Oh, how much are the tickets?
$50.
That sounds doable.
It’s a great show, there’s not a bad seat in the house, we were here last night.
What time does it start?
8.
That’s good, it’ll give us time to make it back to Palmdale.
We came from Victorville.
We used to go to Vegas all the time but after that shooting, we come here.
Oh, a friend of ours told us we should come here and it really is nice.
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This is what I made a point to remember from her husband; songwriter and lead guitarist, Neil Giraldo -‘Spider’ –
I’m a songwriter, I have to write a song every day, good or bad
There are 4 things that make a song a hit:
a. It must make the hearer feel it is his song, reflecting his own personal feelings, recalling his memories. It must play in his head long afterwards; in the shower, in the car, at bedtime..
b. It must have a good melody, memorable enough thatyou hear it in your head long after.
c. It must have a good tempo. When playing, you should make mistakes sound awesome. It may seem like a minor thing but it’s the little things that make the song great.
d. It must have a beginning that is instantly recognizable. The listener recognizes the song immediately and looks forward to the rest of the song.
She does that all the time, Rob. It’s like she never got the attention she needed back in her red rope days. Can you imagine Miss Glam going to survival school? 20 fuckers killed themselves every day to get her some edible grub so she wouldn’t mess up her nail polish.
If I was married to one of the Solid Gold Dancers, I’d be out hustling every day; Momma needs a new fur coat!! Doc Pangloss
You know good and well I was the first one to have my tent packed and the campfire started in survival school. I refused to be one of “those” women.
As far as my needing attention and derailing the discussion… a truly meaningful discussion should not be easily derailed by a little bunny poo flinging. What happened to you pack of shitflingers while I was on hiatus? Did you all get snipped?
Like Beatrice Potter supposedly said when criticized for using a few difficult words in her bunny books: I believe children like the occasional big word they need to examine.
A little bunny poo is good for any discussion. It invites earthworms which are just flat out awesome when it comes to fixing a mess.
And, by the way, I am Maggie, sponsor of Unremarkable longagofaraway on Mulberry Street. I can dump a load of bunny poo on any post he makes. It is in the contract.
I also drop turtles when I get an unexpected visitor in the barnyard.
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As far as vermin removal, this guy is great by the pond, but I suspect my Little Miss Missy might get her nose bitten off. She’s a bit of a dumbass doggie, but we have grown to love her. I gave her a haircut and it is hilarious. Perhaps I’ll link to an album later, but probably not.
Jake is too crotchety to haul 40 miles to get clipped, so I bought giant clippers and we clipped him. The pup was a bit of a challenge and she looks like a castaway mutt. The JDAWG is still lying in state by the garden.
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I explained to my husband, much to his horror, exactly where you would cut to get the tender meat of the turtle’s underbelly, if you wanted to eat snapping turtle. Which I do NOT, by the way, but I have eaten it in my lifetime and would again if necessary. However, some people really like turtle meat.
Which, by the way, brings us to here.
http://horrorfreaknews.com/pennywises-arch-enemy-turtle-hiding-new-trailer
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By the way, Admin… I understand the data business much better, so I try to host my images elsewhere.
In fact, I am using Facebook to host my video clips. There is a way to get a link for a video and I figure if more people use Snoopbook as a hosting platform and less as a self-aggrandizing platform (who, ME?) it will at least be of use to someone.
Sometimes I just gotta get the last word in. It’s a fault I have that I can’t seem to overcome.
I was perusing Bill Coopers book for a minute. A couple things stood out.
In his introduction he said “To remain apathetic is assured enslavement. To learn the truth and act upon it is the only means of survival at this moment. To shrug off the information contained in this book and to disregard its warning will result in the complete destruction of the Republic of the united States of America. You will never get a second warning or second chance. Like it or not, this is it, stark reality. You can no longer turn your head, ignore it, pretend it’s not true, say “it can’t happen to me,” run or hide. The wolf is at the door.”
The last thing he said in his introduction:
“I believe that any man without principles that he is ready and willing to die for at any given moment is already dead, and is of no use or consequence whatsoever.”
If I could bold the words “stark reality” I would. Because that’s the point. 27 years ago that was the stark reality. How do we know what is real anymore?
I only know one way and it has been my experience, “my reality”, that this is true.
“5 Now if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask for it from God, who gives to all without reservation and not reproaching, and it will be given to him. 6 But let him ask for it in faith, without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed about. 7 For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. ” James 1:5-8
Enjoy your weekend, Uncola.
Thank you, MC. You have a good weekend too
You couldn’t just let MC have the last word, could you? And now that Admin has unstuck the post, I guess I get the last word. Which is as it should be… Jfish is not favored. He is just more productive.
While I wile away the hours waiting for the storm to come ashore, this thread is good reading. My thanks to Doug and respondents. I question my ability to add to the wise words in a meaningful way. I relate the wisdom here to poetry of my past and humbly offer this one:
Prelude
Prelude to a drama casting forth its net
Bylines crossing over expectations still unmet
Sequels’ after stories ended by decree
Silent opposition wracks the family
Answer to the question no solution found
Lacking graceful reasons alibis abound
Consequential actions banned by le gal-ity
Circumstantial complicity cop’s a plea
Indentured to adventures somewhat ill advised
A future guaranteed yet seeking a surprise
Not only legal for that is only law
The relative opinion sticks in the craw
Silence will forsake any fortune told
Secrets silence actions and they grow old
Perspicacious facts avoiding reality
Sink or swimming in double duality
Infinite reservations clamor for the room
Cleansed of fabled foibles de-void of any gloom
Immensities abound seeking virtuous respite
Love Beauty Happy dancing in the night
See? I even brought You Know Whosie out to play.
I made a rather lengthy comment about James needing to add a 6th installment. A summary of the five seemingly disjointed letters would help.
Stucky? As a favor to me could you see if you give a shit about the “other” James in the KJV? And, while you are at it, clear up who called Mary “mother” other than the top dog?
I only hear Laurel. I am deaf to the other word doppelgänger. High frequency hearing loss solves the dilemma for me. I once saw a video that demonstrated how Chinese children learn to distinguish tonal differences and it is locked by age three. An occidental having never heard those tonal distinctions will lose the ability to hear the difference somewhere around age three. I cannot find a similar video but share one about tonal Chinese language. I read that many Asian languages are very tonal.
In Viet Nam, 2001 or so, I accompanied my hula Hilo Hi girl friend and her VN mother to VN. We stayed at the mother’s three story home plus a weekend at the Caravelle. I had a suit custom tailored and when we entered the taxi to depart I was assailed by a beggar. I used my understanding of the language (extremely limited) to tell him NO, I am not interested. My gf’s mother said I called him a pussy….
The subject of neurolinguistic programming is rich. Asians have a rich culture incorporating tiny nuances of speech, most unavailable to to the ears of a non native.